Leave, cleave, one flesh (II) In-laws who become outlaws

The order first  leaving father and mother and  then  cleaving to each other (Genesis 2:24), is important. If we don't leave in a healthy way, we wont cleave (bond) in a healthy way. Today I want to say that the difficulty in leaving is compounded if the parents have difficulty in letting go. In-laws who become outlaws is a humorous way if describing what ranges from interference, to manipulative guilt trips. And this happens all too easily, especially if it's been a part of the family dynamics. It won’t be called interference or manipulation of course, it will be called love , concern or simply wanting to still be involved in your lives.  Certainly there is healthy involvement, but  there is also unhealthy involvement! What can seem at first to be small, can take on enormous proportions, and asking questions can unveil some of the problems. With whose parents do you spend Christmas and Thanksgiving? Do you always have to take their advice,  and are there consequences (hurt feelings, accusations etc.,etc.) when the “advice” is rejected. Many of these problems can be worked through in premarital counseling, and in learning to set healthy boundaries.

What about jealousy? “You spend more time with his/her parents than you do with us, what are we chopped liver?” Will you allow the “squeaky wheel” to get the grease? What are the expectations, and how far are you willing to let the “outlaws” to make decisions for you? These things are easier to work out before the marriage than they are afterwards, and it is one (of many) reasons why short engagements are not always helpful. The time of an engagement is a time to work out many things. It is said that the secret of marriage is negotiation. And part of the negotiation is to figure out how you are going to negotiate the expectations of the in-laws, and  to evaluate where each one is in the leaving process. We need to honour our parents for sure, but we also need a healthy separation from them.

Problems can still manifest even if the parents are dead, or not around. We may feel that we don’t have separation issues from our parents, but still be influenced by unacknowledged  family dynamics that clash, or worse are exactly the same and therefore lead to the same dysfunction. I have mentioned boundaries several times now, and setting healthy boundaries is no easy task at the best of times. Perhaps this is the place to say that it is my feeling that the boundaries course by Cloud and Townsend should be part of our  discipleship programs The teaching is especially useful in helping us to do the often hard work of  leaving leaving in a healthy way while at the same time honouring them. To say it again, setting boundaries and managing expectations is important. It but in my opinion many of these things are easier to negotiate before the knot is tied.

Father, many of us have only now even begun,  to see that Your ways are best, and we have reaped and are still reaping the consequences of going our own way. But I want to thank You Lord, that when we turn to You in repentance,  confessing where we have failed, You start to “restore the years that the locusts have eaten” (Joel 2:25). That is as we turn to You, You begin the work of bringing us to into life in all its fullness. In the meantime Lord, we come to You for peace,   comfort and strength in Jesus Name Amen